Wow. I don't know what else to say but WOW.
When we pulled up, I mentioned to Mike quietly, "There's going to be poetry reading tonight too" and as soon as we were out, he locked the doors and acted like he was going to drive off. Then he unlocked the doors and came in with us.
Well, we will start with the cafe. The Tap Root Cafe is a tiny cafe with wooden tables and high stools. There is a bar on one side that takes up nearly half the place, but it's not hard alcohol, just beer and mead and lots of it. Local microbrews on tap in a tiny local restaurant. I love this town. We found a table and sat down and watched Marian and her young and talented guitarist (who's name has completely left my mind) set up.
She came over and introduced herself, and I told her I was a huge fan and there were handshakes all around. She was so nice and after finding out we hadn't been to the Tap Root Cafe before, she recommended the burgers.
So we all ordered burgers. I got a chicken burger dripping with cheese and wrapped in bacon, William got a curry burger of some sort that was served on toasted sourdough, Mike had a mushroom burger, and E had a cheese burger. All we served with a mix of yam and potato fries that were seasoned to perfection. They also have juice and smoothies, everyone got a smoothie except for me. I opted for a Midnight Sun Brewing Co. Panty Peeler.
Mike's smoothie had peanuts or peanut butter in it. I took a sip and so did E and we decided we must make smoothies that was sometime. It was yummy.
My beer was great too. Mike said he preferred the Fallen Angel, but it was very drinkable. Yum yum.
She did her sound check by playing a song and then the music started. She played things off her current albums and SotM (which is afaik, only available on itunes) and things from the album she's working on. She did a very wordy song written to Mr. Darcy about how there might be something fierce when you pull back the polite that was wonderful.
Not really a Browncoat crowd, her songs off Got to Fly still really worked for the audience. "It's Good To Have Jayne On Your Side" became a song about a guy from Spenard, and she invited audience participation. We did enthusiastically. Mike singing out loud very happy to hear his favorite song. People laughed at the right times and were quiet for the thoughtful introspective songs.
She did "I'll Still Be a Geek" playing her typewriter and I just couldn't stop smiling.
The poet, who did a couple readings in between songs was Keith Liles. For all Mike's worry about losing his poetry reading virginity, the poems were modern enough with enough humor to keep him interested. They were funny, introspective, and while starting occasionally with a fairly depressing viewpoint of the world, they ended optimistically. He did one about Superman which just made E laugh with delight for both the words and the fact that Mike was wearing his Superman shirt so people turned to look at him. For Mike, to date, the only poetry he really has liked has been Ernest Cline. He liked Keith Liles too. Maybe I can start getting him to poetry readings that don't have a singer he really likes at them!
We ordered the Aphrodite's Kiss to snack on after our meal was done. Hummus, tabbouleh, cucumbers, almonds, olives, and feta all served with toasted sourdough. E picked it over salsa because she loves hummus. It was the first time everyone but me had tabbouleh. William and E liked it, Mike didn't. Too minty. I ate a few bites just happy as can be. It was bright and perfect.
We also had coffee after dinner while watching the show. At one point there was an odd moment of seeing E up at the bar bouncing to the music waiting for the coffee to get refilled. It was wild seeing my daughter handle herself with so much calm and cool in a situation she was clearly the youngest person at. While it was an all ages show, the guitarist and maybe 4 other people in the packed cafe were William's age, and only E was younger.
During intermission, she gave me a hug and we talked for a few minutes. She is so very nice.
She also played a few covers, including one of my favorite Joni Mitchell songs, Twisted. That was so great. I'd love to have a copy of her singing it.
It was wonderful. I'm glad we went. The cover charge was honor system, and we paid a bit over the suggested amount since I have all her albums already.
Oh! And E wants me to put her songs on her ipod now. *grins* Perfectly happy too.
You can stream her songs from her website and you can buy her albums from all the usual suspects.

I needed some sleep. The whole museum thing was just a little more than I should have done yesterday, and when we were all done it was pretty bad. I try not to ask for help in public, but we had breakfast at the museum cafe when we were done at the museum, and I needed Mike's help to get up.
Then the car didn't start. We knew the starter might go out, and sure enough it did. So Dad drove me to his house, and the kids walked from the museum back to dad's house.
It was worth it though.
See, Dad loves stuff like this, when we manage to drag him to it. The museum, the zoo, he's like a 12 yo you can't really discipline for saying totally the wrong things, but he does love it. This exhibit was one he actually indicated an interest in. Gold does the weird things in his brain it does in a lot of people's minds. Historically, it's wild that people get so entranced with the shiny. But tickets to the exhibit were expensive. It would have cost nearly 100 dollars for my family to go, and as much as he wanted to go, he wasn't willing to spring for tickets and didn't want us to spring for them. Well, Mike was offered tickets, and when he was, he asked for 5 since he knew Dad wanted to see it.
Dad loved it. There was a gambler's watch fob on display that was made with nuggets as big as my thumb, so very ostentatious and coins, bricks, ancient jewelry, and lots and lots of information. The kids were less entranced, but loved the interactive things.
Well, Mike and Dad called our mechanic, and after towing the car back to dad's house, it was repaired pretty handily. Mike tipped our mechanic a bit for the weekend housecall. Hey, now we don't have to worry about the starter, so Mike and I made tentative plans for next weekend assuming good weather.
As kids of a Crafty Mother, the teens were most interested in the embossed foil primitive ornaments for burial and jewelry, and with the room leafed in 3 oz. of gold leaf. *checks archives* Back in August 2006, I came up with a foil pendant pattern that was fairly easy to assemble with an inclusive bail for the kids to learn foil embossing with. So now back to the craft store for more foil, and I'll finalize the pattern design in a form I can post online and make more. For a leafing craft, we are going to decorate composition books. Cover the cover with black paint or black paper, then create a design over that in hot glue, and apply leafing to that, plus leafing some beads using inexpensive leaf. After the learn how to do leafing, they will both think of a project they want to use real gold leaf on, and design it, do a practice version with the cheap stuff, then get real gold leaf to do the real thing with.

Oh! I need to get a picture, Mike got me a gorgeous Bate Graphite Sculpture. It's a small piece shaped like bamboo. The pictures don't do these justice. It's a shiny dark gray that's cool and lovely to touch. I saw them, and just couldn't keep my hands off them. So satisfying on some many levels, the feel, the look of them, art writing implements. The frustrated artist in me and the writer in me just sung with the pretty of them. What would I write, draw, with such a thing? Just so beautiful. *spoiled*

Posted on Don't Eat the Paste about going to the museum today. I'll write in more detail about it later, but wanted to let you all know. I'm working really hard at building up traffic there, like I said, this IS my primary blog, and will remain so and will be more personal than the other one, but the other one is the one I'm working on building up into a consistent craft blog, which means some stuff from here will be cross posted to there, and printables will be posted there.
Whew.. so all that to say.. I'm doing a giveaway there. 4 lucky winners will win just a little touristy prize of a few Alaskan postcards and a bookmark I picked up with a nice image of Athabaskan clothing. You can find out more info here.

The gold thing was NEAT. I'm glad we got the tickets so we didn't just send Dad with the kids, because Dad would have made the kids crazy. Dad was all wander-y and fascinated. I found a lot more interesting than I would have. There was some good information about the environmental impact of gold (bad! Boo hiss!) mining and some amazing looking crystal gold formations, as well as jewelry and ornaments dating back a very long time.
They also had an activity area to make crowns out of paper with sparkly little plastic gems to decorate them with. E took a bunch of blue squares and made a shiny Tardis. Dr. Who obsession!

New printable, and a cute picture of E's shadow.

Let's see.. got distracted while working on things I meant to work on and worked on other stuff instead like starting to rework my banner on DETP.

YAY! Mike just called. There is a gold exhibit at the local museum my dad was really kind of interested in but didn't want to spend the money to go to. Mike and I were planning to buy tickets for him and the kids, but someone gave him a couple passes today. She asked him "Will you go?" and Mike said "I'll take 5 passes if I can, and all of us will go." so she gave him 5 passes. I just called Dad and he's happy. I guess this is our summer of gold. The gold exhibit, gold panning.. gold glitter wands.

Once a week or so, I talk the kids through making dinner. Last night it was spaghetti. Not my normal spaghetti which is fairly complex, but a quick version. It turned out very good and the kids were proud of themselves. Tonight we are having leftovers for dinner. The way too peppery chicken I made a few days ago, leftover spaghetti, and probably butternut squash and some sweet potato fries. (The way too peppery chicken was a hit with E and Mike who both said it was perfect. I had to scrape it off.)
I mixed a pepper/salt shaker for Mike and E to use on their food, so instead of the usual 3 shakers, they have one. It's 1:2:7 red pepper, sea salt, black pepper. Yes, they actually do use that much pepper. On darn near everything. For normal people, I'd suggest 2:1:1 no salt seasoning of choice, salt, pepper. Garlic or paprika are good choices. We use a variation of that instead of furikake for stenciling on E's rice since she dislikes nori so intensely.

Mike needed a pink shirt for work tomorrow. He's always been bothered by the amount of leeway women have in business dress but men don't have much at all, essentially the same outfit for a century for business dress. One day earlier this month, a woman he worked with made comments about how men shouldn't wear pink shirts. That just rubbed that annoyance all wrong. So tonight we went out looking for a pink shirt in his size. He and a few of his male co-workers are planning to wear pink shirts. Love that man. Not only did he decide then and there to get a pink shirt and wear it to work, but he convinced some of his co-workers to do the same.
After we went out to eat at Cafe Amsterdam. Cafe Amsterdam has decent food and truly impressive beer list with a lot of good local brews on tap. I had the same thing I usually have, an avocado melt, which is entirely too much of a very good thing. Mike had a salad. For an appetizer we had a really garlicky hummus served with pita triangles, tomatoes, cucumbers, olives and feta. Yum yum! I decided I was in the mood for beer, and look at their tap list (really, who would drink bottled when you're someplace that has tap at perfect drink temperature?) I opted for Midnight Sun Brewing Company's Fallen Angel. I admit it, I asked the waitress what kind of beer it was like it wasn't just the name that convinced me. She didn't know, and I ordered it anyway.
Oh my.. it was so good. Crisp and yeasty which usually don't go hand in hand in a beer. The bubbles were very fine and the head was dense and solid. The fruity flavors were reminiscent of some white wines I've had, but all backed with that nice yeasty bready flavor. I took a sip, and then a swallow and offered the glass to Mike. He asked "How is it?" and I said "I like it!". He took a sip and said "This is good!". Mike started drinking wines in Italy as a teenager, and at 18, he was in Germany. His palate for beers is pickier then mine. So it was nice to have my first taste validated. We shared the beer and got just a tiny bit buzzed since we don't really ever drink. Turns out that nice crisp flavor and mid-light amber color hid an 8% alcohol content. We are SO going to the brewery to pick some up. Yep yep. YUM! Plus, I've GOT to try baking with it.
Other then that, I spent the day restringing a pearl necklace, and working on a couple projects in between playing Mafia Wars on Facebook. So very E.H.'s fault. I was curious to see what she'd play and got hooked. If you play Mafia Wars on Facebook, please look me up and add me as a friend so I can increase my Mafia size!
After I finish knotting the pearl strand, I've got a couple book reviews to write, then I'm working on a printable box for cupcakes. Well.. it should all be done in the next few days, and I have a new bread recipe to finish up typing up. But Friday we are heading out to Eagle River to pick up some stuff Mike saw on Craigslist he wants. In theory, we will hit a couple shops out that way I love too.

Oh? The title? At Cafe Amsterdam, the clock on the wall is stopped at 4:20.

You see, since I got the bag of ties at the thrift store, she's been wearing them. With teeshirts, with turtle necks, not so much with button down shirts. So at some point I need to go through her brother's old shirts for her, but yesterday we bussed up to the thrift store to get her a couple shirts to wear with her ties. The SA right next to Value Village as usual had dress shirts terribly overpriced, but were having a 10 books for a 1 sale, any books. Hardcover whatever. Well, it was actually hard to find 10 books I wanted, but I did. One of them being a Dr. Who book for E which made her super happy.
We stopped by Terra Bella for a snack. Terra Bella has locally roasted organic coffee and organic treats. E had a green tea cupcake and I had pumpkin/chocolate chip bread. We decided we needed to come up with a pumpkin cupcake recipe soonish.
Mike came to get us and took us out to dinner where we discussed E's current wardrobe choices. See.. almost everything she wears these days is inspired by one doctor or another. She's a little obsessive about them.
Since her b-day is coming up, I ordered her a sonic screwdriver pen with a psychic paper wallet.
In other news, I'm starting to like Facebook more and more as I get back in touch with people I've missed. It's nice in a way talking to people I haven't seen in 15 or so years, but as close as I was to those people at that point in my life, it's really nice getting in touch with people I've "met" in the last 12 years on the net who have come to mean something to me, who have been inspirations to me in this part of my life, who have encourage me to grow as a person, and who are just amazing people themselves.
I tried to make a list of the people who have changed my life in a lot of ways since way back when.. I can't really, not and be really fair to each of them and the influence and encouragement they gave me. So I'm just going to say thank you.
And!! Miss Teri found me a pterodactyl for my Torchwood bag! Yay!!!
On the subject of yesterday's losses...
The first time I ever danced on a stage in front of an audience of hundreds, it was to Beat It. I remember my costume, I remember most of the choreography. It's a treasured memory because of the feeling of rightness, that was what all the training and practice was about, that moment on the stage. So yes, I had the Thriller album. I remember practicing for hours to make sure every move I made was on count. In the mid-80s, on some level, I realized the tragedy of his life, and after that, every time I saw him in a video or interview, it struck me again. That all those normal moments in my life that were set to a soundtrack that he was a part of, were things he'd never know. I felt sorry for him, and never quite got over that. Mike and I have talked about it a lot through the years and the scandals. A lot of celebrities made the choice at some point, I'm not sure he knew the choice was there to be made until he was far too famous to make it, to make a choice for a normal life. Rest in peace. You deserve some rest and peace.
Farrah wasn't a big thing in my life. I enjoyed Charlie's Angels, but I was just a kid and she wasn't my favorite Angel, but I do admire how she kept fighting, and my prayers are with her family and most especially with Ryan today. I may not have cared for her films, but love.. I do care about love and lovers, and he loved her so very much.

Today was the Pride parade and festival. It was a record breaking year for it as far as number of participants in the parade and number of vendors at the festival.
( more about it back here )
After that, we went to Bosco's because today was free RPG day. Like free comic book day, it's a day for RPG makers to offer freebies. And there was much rejoicing.

Well.. Mike keeps asking "What do you want to do for dinner?" then a few minutes later "Have you figured out dinner yet?" so I'd better decide if I want to cook or go out or what I want I want to do for dinner. Which.. sounds kind of sexist, but it's not. Mike is pretty happy with whatever I pick, but on days my pain levels are really high, my tummy gets upset and there are a lot of things I can't eat.

I've been using my Captain Hammer bag forever, and today was the first day people recognized the logo. Ironically, today was also the day I finally found a purse that fit my needs. Big enough for the electronics I carry regularly and my glasses case for my sunglasses, made in the USA, and made out of post consumer waste. It's made out of truck tire inner tubes, reclaimed water hose, and reclaimed wood. It's even fairly grown up looking. I have a grown up purse! I told Mike grown up shoes are next.
( our day at the Solstice fair )
And the day ended with herring. It was really kind of a perfect day even if my pain levels were really high for most of it.

Since the gym closes early on Sundays during the summer months, we decided to go out to Potter's Marsh and go for a walk instead. It was really bright and my camera doesn't much like bright. It tends to do a sort of painterly effect to pictures taken in very bright light and I sometimes have to duplicate the layer on multiply at 25% to really see what's there.
That said.. I got a picture I love of a raven, some geese and if you look very carefully a bald eagle.

I really love how it being so bright winds up putting that raven on a light post on a white background.

I guess the eagles attacked a raven nest, so the ravens are attacking the eagles. It's like bird turf wars. I was talking to one of the scientists who volunteers time out there during the summer to talk to tourists.

This year, the Green Court is doing Antony and Cleopatra and everyone dodged Mike's tomatoes with one exception. The actor playing Cleo caught one, and dropped it quite deliberately on Caesar's head. So for the rest of the show, Caesar spent the time trying to get Cleo with a tomato. It was hilarious.
The Historic Recrudescence Guild was doing demonstrations so I spoke to the baker about bread recipes, wild yeast and other such things. The rest of my family was very patient about it. I learned a few things I didn't know, she learned a few she didn't know, which makes it all a very good conversation.

I picked myself up two skirts and a nice eye piece of stained glass. I like eyes! Just all round a lot of fun. Education, humor, and guilt free locally made clothing. Mike and I drank some mead and laughed very hard.

So now I'm working on re-doing my miniature book page with all new mini-books which are going to be in 1/12 scale for standard hardcovers.

Here's the plan on my Bread e-book, assuming enough interest, I'll keep selling it and work on a volume two with more recipes and such. If interest has been strong enough, I'll have a saddle stitched half size zine printed up which I'll send to anyone who bought the e-book version, and I'll sell the saddle stitched book as well. So I'm keeping track of who gets it and I'll email them when it's time to get a good address.
Well.. back to work.

This weekend is our local ren fair, which is something that a lot of people don't seem to do locally. The same people who say "There's nothing going on in Anchorage." hah.. you're not looking hard enough. No, it's not a big fair, it's a really small one, but it's a lot of fun and our family looks forward to it every year. William and Mike love the black smithing demos, and I love the fact they always have pretty little forged hair sticks for my very long hair. Cold iron hair sticks, I'm so ready for when Fairies Attack. E, William and I usually buy some soap too. Soap is a good thing. William and Mike are also super eager for the food of course. Friar Tuck's been selling corn there so long I remember the summer my high school sweetheart worked for them. Same owners, same yummy corn. E loves the silly hats and always gets something. William loves the pottery being the tactile young man he is. He treasures his handmade cups and loves talking to the people who make them.
What everyone looks forward to is the tomato theater. Our local ren faire is not period, at one point we had two fairs, one was period and the other was fantasy and theater. Anchorage couldn't support both though, so the period one wound up integrated with the fantasy one. There's a back story, and 3 courts, red which is noble and good, green which is evil and constantly at odds with red, and blue which are neutral and selling to whoever has the most to offer. The Green Court puts on a show every year of the Scottish play and sells rotten tomatoes to the audience. After many years of doing this, the actors are very good at ducking. But Mike's very good at throwing. Darts, hatchets, you name it, he can throw it. Last year he caught one of the actors on the cheek and the whole audience just roared. So we buy a basket of tomatoes every year, and the kids throw some and well.. half the time miss the stage, and Mike throws a bunch more to everyone's delight. Well.. except the Green Court. (reminder- put a soapy washcloth in a bag in your purse this year Shala.. tomato slime is icky)
So.. that's my weekend. Or at least that's tomorrow. I will have my fortune read if the line isn't too long, buy soap and probably a shiny or two, Mike will throw tomatoes and eat a smoked turkey leg, E will probably wind up with a rainbow colored witches hat, and William will just love it like he always does.
Other then that, I finished my bread baking e-book. Most of it is stuff that's been posted on here before, some new information. I also wrote a kindle edition, but it's got a couple typos in it. They don't really affect the content if you're used to my occasional skipped words and typos, but a modified version should be available soon. That's here.
I also baked some nice little rounds of bread last night for us to bring with us to the fair to snack on. Maple sugar with cinnamon. Yum yum!

( Dinner, tourist style )
Today, Mike's got to do some coffee related research, so I'm going with him to do that. Apparently his boss asked the execs "Which of you is the coffee fiend?" and Mike said "My wife." I was a little taken aback by that. I don't do 5 dollar cups of coffee often. So when he explained this to Dad and I, I said "I'm not a coffee fiend." and dad said "Yes, you are." and Mike just laughed out loud and said "Uh huh.. why won't you drink Starbucks?" We have a bunch of GOOD local coffee roasters who don't burn the beans. I don't think this makes me a coffee fiend. But good coffee is like good beer or good wine. You can taste notes and flavors in it, but when the beans are burnt, the overwhelming flavor is that burn. You lose the complexity that inherent in a good cup of coffee. Coffee can taste bright, or creamy, have chocolate-y or berry notes, burnt is not the flavor I'm looking for.
But I'm not a *fiend* about it. I've never even gone to a coffee tasting or done any research on it. I just know what I prefer. Fair trade, shade grown, beans drum roasted dark. I like French, Espresso, and Turkish roasts, but I want the beans to be drum roasted to a uniform dark, and still oily to the touch. A good dark roast IS shiny and oily and not dark, matte and dry. Drum roasting helps keep the beans from scorching. Dark roasts also have less caffeine then light roasts so they make good after dinner coffees.
I think today I'm also going to work some on beading, and I wrote a book review for Beaded Chain Mail Jewelry by Dyson Whyte, it's a great book if you have any interest in small scale mail for jewelry.

So we went out to Potter's Marsh, which isn't green yet. The whole broadwalk is open now though.
We saw geese, loons and eagles which were too far away to get pictures, but were so neat to watch.
The eagles were accidental. When we got the end of the new section, I laid down on one of the benches and saw a speck moving across the sky. So high up I wasn't sure if it was something on my glasses or something I actually saw. I pointed it out to Mike and he used his binoculars to look. It was an eagle that was joined by another. I don't know if it was a mating dance or not, but the two specks flew in and out of the clouds circling each other.
Yeah. So high up they were flying into clouds.
We saw moose tracks, but it's hard to get excited about seeing moose when you see them in your front yard, or stopping up traffic regularly. Next month it should be ducks, geese, and cranes at Potter's Marsh.
We also grabbed some dead birch branches to carve. Fun fun!
I worked some on beading yesterday, but spent most of yesterday just reading. I had started Charlaine Harris' Shakespeare books halfway through, so I read the first two yesterday on my Kindle.

( What we did yesterday )
Well.. still working on new earring patterns with an eye towards a slim volume of brick stitched earrings. I'll need to find beaders to bead up samples of some of them.
Music- Did you know that Miracle Laurie has a ukulele cover band? If you like ukulele covers, it's worth a listen. Uke Box Heroes Myspace.
Also for NIN or Jane's Addiction fans out there.. you can get an ep of unreleased material here, 2 NIN songs, 2 by Jane's Addiction, and 2 by Street Sweeper.

Fur Rendezvous, more commonly called just Fur Rondy is our big winter festival. It's both the name of a World Championship Sled Dog race, not quite as big as the Iditarod, and the name of the festival. It's a city wide thing that is so very Alaskan. There are craft shows and competitions (I didn't enter this year, but I've won ribbons in the beadwork section in the past), there is a fur bikini contest, in fact, there are a lot of things that make animal rights groups hate us in it. Like the fur and the dog sled races weren't enough, a brand new part of it is Bob and Mark's brain child Running with the Reindeer, William Oefelein and his partner Colleen Shipman both signed up to be in that. I guess they are moving here now that they've both retired from their military careers.
When I was a kid, I won second place in the booster button design contest. My mom was outrageously proud of me, and my kids, when they think of it, wear that button during Fur Rondy. I buy that one when I see it at thrift stores to give to friends.
I have a lot of happy memories of going to various Fur Rondy events around town as a kid, and even as a young woman, but the last few years, my health or my body have kept me from them. This weekend, we made a point of bring the kids (I know.. W=not a kid anymore, but he'll ALWAYS be a kid to me I think). It was about 20°F, and I gotta tell you.. not a CHANCE I'd sit on one of those cold plastic seats and get colder riding a carnival ride, but they had a blast.
Mike went with full intention of getting horrible for you carnival food, but decided his hands were better in his pockets. He won me a cute bear to go in my collection of bears he's won me, and W won me a purple gorilla. After, we went to one of our favorite local places to eat. It's a little diner with formica tables and cheerful waitresses and the BEST Monte Cristo sandwich in town.
It was a lot of fun.
( pic of the kids )
I'm glad we went Saturday, the temp has dropped again, and it's a lot colder now.

Today is the spinning class E and I are taking together, I asked Kim if she wanted to go, and at first she thought I meant spinning like the exercise, and was thrilled, then she found out I meant making yarn, and decided against it.
I'm excited about it though. This is something I've been wanting to learn to do for awhile.

Last night, Mike decided he wanted to take me out. I'm not sure where or what I was thinking. I knew we had to go to a bead store, and we did that. And I was dressed completely informally. Black skirt, cute teeshirt that said "Go Away, Get off my planet!" (which is what I'm wearing today too. I only had it on for a couple hours yesterday, and I need to get laundry done. Don't judge me. You've done it before too.), my alien necklace from Gina, and my gitd alien bracelet and my alien earrings.There was definitely a theme going. At the beadstore, Cat said she thought the alien earrings would look cute in the size 15 delicas, but for some reason, I didn't register she meant *my* alien earrings, so I asked her which ones. She said "Didn't you make alien earrings?" then noticed I was wearing them. I felt.. umm.. really really stupid?
After though.. Mike wanted to go out to a grown up restaurant without the kids together. We stopped by the Bear's Tooth, but they were, of course, SLAMMED. An hour wait for a table. Then we decided on Italian, and he took me to Villa Nova.
Oh wow.. it was so good. He asked me what kind of appetizer I wanted, he was looking at a few things on the regular menu, but on the specials for the day was an artichoke/crab/gruyere dip. So we ordered that. It was so rich, it was foreplay. The meal was the foodgasm. I tend too often to just eat for fuel, and not indulge often. This whole meal was an indulgence. Dessert was something like a chocolate cream puff. Fresh, handmade puff pastry filled with chocolate mousse,topped with a chocolate ganache, served in a puddle of chocolate sauce with bits of chocolate in it. All high quality chocolate. We shared. It was so good. I did wind up ordering one to go at the same time for E. I felt a little guilty, since my leftovers from dinner are going to be given to W. I wondered if E would be able to eat the whole thing. I know at Nordstroms she can't not eat a whole slice of chocolate cake because it's so rich and dark, but I guess since the mousse wasn't dark, and with the puff pastry to cut the total chocolateness of it, she had no issues and ate the whole thing happily.
Dinner? ( Cut to spare the vegetarians, vegans and anyone anti-meat )
It was lovely, and the waitress complimented my earrings and teeshirt, which made Mike all smug because I'd snarled at him "If I'd known we were going someplace nice to eat, I'd have dressed for it." But Alaska being what Alaska is, honestly, I can't think of any restaurant in town you can't get away with casual clothes. We tend to be fairly casual people, even when we go out. He knew what he had planned, and wore a long sleeved Metallica teeshirt.
Well.. my opinions aside.. what did the guy who went to high school in Italy think? He liked it. The chef hasn't Americanized the dishes, or given in the "more garlic means more authenticity" habit. He does wish that more restaurants in the US had parking like in Italy. Where you park someplace 4 or 5 blocks away and have a nice walk before and after the slow take your time meal. He was thrilled with the chocolate dessert. Which I picked. They recite the dessert menu there, and it was hard to keep up with. Usually I *don't* order chocolate desserts. I'm picky. But their cream sauces were so perfect, I figured the chocolate would be good too. The only disappointment for Mike and I was the bread. It was plain, white, boring and predictable rather then the artisan breads we've been getting used to in those sorts of places. Mike likes bread with texture and bits of grain. I really wish I could understand why the big chains like Outback and Chili's are so popular when for pretty close to the same amount, you can go to a local place with amazing food. And wow.. I'm absolutely sure that right at this moment, the other Cat.. the one in California? Is seriously seriously wishing she were in Alaska.
E of course, thought Mc Donald's (which we also picked up for her on the way home) and a fancy dessert make nearly the perfect meal.
Tonight I'm making chicken teriyaki for dinner I think. With a ton of veggies to help make up for the total indulgence last night. Plus I think when I get to the gym, I'll do a half hour extra cardio.
But.. it was a lovely evening!

Yesterday was a lot of fun, and a LOT of walking, but I found 3 things I have to brag about. Links and pictures of all but one of them will follow later.
The one I'm not taking a picture of by request of the artist, is my favorite. And I'll post her email link later when I find her card. It was a pretty hinged stained glass necklace with two layers. The first layer was a scrap of glass, and under that, a layer of metal with embossed foil tape with one of my favorite John Lennon quotes on it. Yay for quote necklaces, double yay for John Lennon quote necklaces.
"Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans."
At the bead show, Karen had magpies. Well.. 2, and I bought one. Because I *heart* magpies. It's a pretty little pin with a very canny looking magpie.
AND one of the artists at the bead show had lampwork eyeball beads! I only found blue in a matching pair, but I'm so making myself a pair of eyeball earrings.
Other then that.. lots of soap of course. I'm not sure if I ever reviewed Gladheart Acres soap, but the other I did. So I'll link back to that review, and add in the now working link to her site, and the Gladheart Acres is an old favorite of my whole family. I got W 2 bars from them.
I considered a diamond willow cane, but I know I don't really have the money right now, plus it would require my admitting it really is a part of my life that isn't going to change, and I'm not willing to do that yet.

Well.. time to get to the gym. I did a lot of walking this week and haven't been to the gym almost all week. It's time to get back into the lifting thing.

I'm not sure how to lead into this without totally pissing off some of the people who read my blog, so.. I'm just going to link to a couple Anchorage Daily News stories.
Game officials kill sow grizzly, try to capture 2 cubs for zoos
Second orphaned cub caught in dog run
We went to the zoo to see the cubs Saturday, they are being sent to Indiana soon. They had just eaten when we got there, and I only got one picture that I really like for posting here.
Also, picture of ducks, and some pretty trees.
( clicky here to see )

I love living here.

Last night we went to the zoo, since it's open late on Tuesdays during the summer for educational stuff, yesterday was bats. Unfortunately, we missed most of that.
But we did get to see the new tigers, or at least one of them. Who prowled close to where we were standing and looking, and gave me a look of utter disdain when I said "Who's a pretty kitty?" Apparently, tigers don't like baby talk.
It was a theme, only one animal active per enclosure except of course for the brown bears. Jake was Jake. He's still my favorite animal in the whole zoo. Although one of the polar bears is running a close second now. The darn thing waited until I had my camera out to start doing what most bears do in the woods, but apparently polar bears do in streams. It was.. disgusting. People were grossed out and kids were thrilled. Esp when it went a little upstream immediately after to drink some water. I waited until it was elsewhere to take pictures. Mike said I should have taken a picture of it while was doing it's thing.
The wolverine was cleaning itself very seriously, and when it got to cleaning itself down there, Mike said "Never saw that in X-men 500." and starting running a little hypothetical dialog between Scott and Logan. Had me in absolute hysterics. Funnier? I was wearing my X-men teeshirt.
The otters were perfect and fun as usual, and the ravens started "talking" as soon as I got close as usual. Mike commented to the kids "They think she's one of them. It's all the black."
After that, we went to Sicily's for dinner. Not my favorite place in town, but hey, it's cheap, and the kids love it. It's 9.99 per person, and they've always got something I'll eat. The kids were thrilled. Double treat, the zoo, then Sicily's for pizza and other goodies. On the way home, we spotted some geese, so of course I jumped out of the car to take pictures. I love geese.
I made myself a set of dpns with dowels I had, so I'll try them out later. Wish me luck. I watched StitchDiva's videos a couple times and I think it mostly makes sense to me now. I couldn't find my thicker dowels, so they are pretty close to a size 8, just a shade smaller.
( wanna see my most current knitting? )
I used own_two_hands's instructions for "embossed" knitting to design it, and worked it from the bottom corner up, and crocheted around the two short sides and crocheted the ties.
I also drew a couple new curve stitch designs, they are pretty big and pretty similar.
first one,second one. I'm thinking of turning the second one into a screen and printing it.
The gym this morning was a lot of no fun. My right knee was acting up pretty badly, but hey, on the bright side, I didn't gain any weight while I was all plague-y and not working out. I shortened my cardio workout by 10 minutes, and skipped the resistance stuff on my legs completely.

Every year, for a few years now, our local abused women's shelter puts on a big awareness/fund raising solstice fair, and every year, we go. We buy our lunch from their big tent, and we buy raffle tickets, and we look at the local art and usually I spend entirely too much money on pretty things.

This year was a little different. Instead I ordered a couple pretty things. Fish Lips and Bird Teeth Studio was there of course, and she hasn't been doing magpies lately. Nobody apparently in Anchorage really likes them, in fact some people have said "Oh.. I used to shoot them." They all want the ravens. Which isn't to say ravens are bad. I like ravens, but I like magpies more. Anyway, she had *censored* with ravens I really loved, but I asked if she could do it with magpies instead. I bought two of her magpies a few years ago, one for me, and one for a friend. She said no problem, and we talked ideas for a few minutes, and I left her my number. I asked her to make 2 *censored* since I plan to give one to my 'pie sister, since I think she really like the last magpie I gave her.

There was a rockhound who calls his business Department of Redundant Redundancy who does pretty fractal teeshirts, note cards,posters and spinning tops.I bought 3 basic fractal notecards from him to frame. Because.. I like fractals.

They had a kiddie section that a lot of not kids were getting stuff from, so we made a donation (a lot of people didn't.. it was sort of sad) and the kids each got a beanie baby they wanted. Then we had lunch, bought our raffle tickets, a couple of inexpensive shirts from previous years.. and started heading back to the car. The kids stopped to play for a little while.

It was a lot of fun.